As part of our core mission at Orchard Place, we work hard to empower youth as emerging leaders. We encourage and equip them to inspire their own path forward and motivate positive change. Using our organizational Sanctuary values: nonviolence, emotional intelligence, social learning, shared governance, open communication, social responsibility, and growth and change, we believe it is imperative to guide our teen clients in developing leadership skills and finding their voices.
As part of this development and aligned with the Sanctuary pillars, there are five key steps that have proven to be helpful in this process. These steps can be used within the context of student groups, classes, or in general in our work with teens:
- Social Learning – Allow youth the opportunity to engage with groups of their peers or within teen leadership structures. Provide guidance on how to successfully and respectfully work with teammates including those with different backgrounds and/or viewpoints to brainstorm, organize, and implement a project or idea. This encourages youth to utilize their natural skillsets and learn from each other to complete a shared vision.
- Shared Governance – Encourage youth to find their voices by giving choices and opportunities. Allow youth to adopt various roles within a group and find what leadership positions they naturally fall into. Guide youth to share in group responsibilities and hold them accountable for tasks that need to be completed. Provide teens with the space to safely voice their celebrations or concerns during the collective process. This will provide teens the opportunity to build and use interpersonal skills in an inclusive, productive, problem-solving way while engaging in open and respectful dialogue.
- Open Communication – When participating in the collaboration process, it is essential that teens learn to use, engage in, and then offer others safe spaces for open communication and transparency. Modeling to teens how to not only leverage their own voice in a healthy way, but to allow others, including those with different perspectives, to express thoughts and ideas that will enhance the process. This practice encourages the development of many leadership competencies including active listening and empowerment of others, plus the opportunity to grow in humility.
- Emotional Intelligence – During the communication process, another key component is to be self-aware and to manage one’s own feelings. In facilitating or participating in group or interpersonal dialogues, social and emotional safety is of the upmost importance. Practicing emotional intelligence is being aware of one’s own thoughts and feelings including the possible influence of implicit bias and establishing boundaries to manage emotional situations. Providing education for teens on the role of emotional intelligence in social situations will help youth to build their own leadership skills and help them more effectively coach others who are striving to reach their own leadership potential.
- Growth and Change – When thinking about how to guide teens to be critical thinkers, problem-solvers, and leaders of the future, we must promote a spirit of positive growth and change. As a trauma-informed care organization, we know that trauma creates a reenactment triangle that can often leave us feeling hopeless and fearful. When demonstrating a growth and change mindset, we allow room to learn from our mistakes, to keep moving forward, and this creates feelings of hope and optimism for the future. Engage youth in conversations on what kind of world they would like to live in and actions they can take to help innovate and build vibrant, diverse, inclusive, and equitable communities. Keep teens future-focused and actively engaged in thinking about living in the world that they aspire to create.
Utilizing these five strategies will help us as peers, caregivers, teachers, coaches, counselors, and anyone who plays a significant role in a teen’s life to help youth employ and enhance their natural gifts and strengths to effectively influence positive change.
Blog Author: Jenna Turner, a K-3 Attendance Initiative Case Manager and Enrichment Coordinator at PACE
Resource: Sanctuary Overview, February 2019
